Essex County sheriff will retire; Undersheriff will run

December 15, 2017

Essex County Sheriff Richard Cutting recently announced he will not run for a third term in November 2018 and will retire at the end of next year.

Meanwhile, Undersheriff Micheal Badger announced his candidacy for the position. Both he and Cutting are Republicans.

Cutting was appointed sheriff after his predecessor, Henry Hommes, died in office in 2010. Cutting then defeated Ike Tyler, a Democrat, and Robert Kirby, an independent, in the general election that year. In 2014 he ran for re-election unopposed.

Badger, who started out as a deputy in 1987, said one of his goals if made sheriff would be to establish gun-training lessons for the public.

"I'd like to start a firearms class for people who would like to get a pistol permit," he said. "We definitely need more training in that area."

Badger said one of the continuing problems in Essex County, and pretty much everywhere in America, is the opioid crisis.

"It's the same as anywhere else," Badger said. "We're constantly seeing people either running drugs or taking them."

Badger said he would like to reconfigure some responsibility with in the department.

"I would also like to get the corrections staff doing more transports rather than the deputies," he said.

Badger has spent the last seven years as Cutting's undersheriff, second in command.

"I'm only 53," he said. "I'm 30 years in, and I think I have a lot left to offer."